Thursday, May 7, 2009

Meet Hercules!

This is my father in law feeding Herky Carrots!













Here is Herky our Llama! He is the watchmen of the sheep herd and he does a mighty fine job of it if I do say so myself! He protects them from the coyotes while they are in the pasture! He doesn't even let the farm dogs bother the sheep! When they are lambing in the winter in the barns he is always right there by the mother making sure she is Okay! When we move the herd to or from the pasture he is the last one to come, he makes sure all of the herd gets to the next destination! He won't leave any behind!! The trapper that comes in the winter says the coyotes just have tracks around the pasture fence now since we have gotten Herky! When he runs he gallops like a horse and gets frisky and bronco kicks once in a while just like a horse does.

3 comments:

~lomacati~ said...

So, he just knows what to do? I can't picture training that into him. That is truly amazing how he has their back and seems to actually care about them. Llamas must be pretty fiesty if they can scare coyotes away. Any idea how he does it? Is it his boldness/confidence that is threatening to them? Had you lost sheep to the coyotes before getting him? We have coyotes around here now, though people have said for years they were around. Last year was the first we'd ever heard them howling and we heard them alot. One morning police/fire sirens went off in town and that got the pack yipping and howling which I thought was funny! Between hubby and I, we've only seen 3. The first one was over 2 years ago very near our house and I found my favorite cat dead in the yard with alot of saliva on it but not eaten so not sure if our dog got involved and stopped it or what happened. One came into our yard in the middle of the afternoon last fall and our dogs chased it off. Then one was coming around repeatedly teasing one of our dogs a couple of nights. We've heard stories about how they'll lure dogs off and kill them. We've also seen clips on youtube of wild coyotes playing with dogs but not hurting them. So you just never know and can't trust them. Knowing they're definitely all around here and are coming onto our yard even with 2 dogs here, I worry sometimes about our kids. Girls are famous for screaming and screeching when they play outside and they say sometimes predator animals mistake those sounds for hurt/weak/young animals sounds. Very scary. Hey, maybe I need to find a llama who'd be willing to pal around with them. ;o)
Lonni

~lomacati~ said...

Speaking of coyotes...There's a fascinating young woman living out west who raised a coyote pup and she still has him. When you get a chance go check out The Daily Coyote (and click on About Us for more cool details). She has a blog by that name and she also wrote a book about the segment of her life after this coyote entered into it. It's good! But her background even before that is really something too. She traveled across the country on her own on a motorized scooter with just the bare essentials, then picked Wyoming for her home after spending only one day there. She's got serious guts and is one strong and self reliant chick! Me, I'd go home crying and shaking after the first day out so I really admire her!

Unknown said...

Yes I always think it is the most Eirree sound I have ever hard when they howl and Yip like that! We have seen them will we are working in the fall field work. We lost 10 one fall! The poor things! The rest of them broke out of the pasture fence and came up to the yard for protection. We didn't know what happened until we went down there! Hercules just naturally hates coyotes. We didn't have to train him! He makes a high pitched humming noise when he is getting worked up! He has big split hooves. He was trying to claw Paul with his hoof when Paul was checking a ewes milk after she gave birth. So we have to keep him away from the lambing barn in the winter.